But Thompson points out that Cisco's plan to generate $12 billion of software-based revenue over the next three to five years seems aggressive. He calls it a "REAL stretch-goal" that will be hard to achieve without a major acquisition.

The Debbie Downer report pushed Cisco's stock down more than 4%, and gave StockTwits traders plenty to chew on.

Thanks for sharing. The thing that stood out for me was a reminder about how much cash Cisco has on its balance sheet.

Plus, the company has been buying back stock and issuing dividends. Those are all healthy signs.

DigDugTrader<$PANW Can we discuss who $CSCO should buy again...or just wait for the stream of articles to tell us....

Haha. Well, I, unsurprisingly, say to wait. Without a crystal ball, it's way too much of a guessing game.

As it evolves into other areas, Cisco faces stiff competition from the likes of IBM, Alcatel-Lucent (ALU) and Hitachi (HTHIY) to name a few. I can't imagine it's not looking at ways to knock one or more of them down a peg or two.